New Products

In what may seem like a curve ball, McIntosh today announced plans to ship the MHT300 “home theater receiver” in March. The pioneering audio company is first and foremost known for its iconic tube-based power amplifiers, which date all the way back to its founding in 1949, and an assortment of separates, including stereo preamplifiers, integrated amps, and more. But AVRs?

No, that’s probably that last thing that comes to mind when you think of McIntosh, even though it’s actually not new territory for the brand. Longtime Mac fans may recall that the company introduced its first AVR — the MHT100 — in 2001 and followed up with the MHT200 “home theater receiver” in 2003.

The forthcoming MHT300 is, indeed, a distant follow-up to those original AV receivers and makes quite a statement both in its capabilities and price — a cool eight grand. McIntosh calls its new AVR an “uncompromising 7.2-channel home theater powerhouse,” rated to deliver 120 watts into 8 ohms with all channels driven; drop impedance to 4 ohms and power increases to 150 watts per channel (full specs were not yet available on the company website but are promised for March). Likely an apt description considering the brand’s proven mastery in the field of audio power.

McIntosh even boldly proclaims: “Don’t be fooled by high watts per channel specs listed by many other AV receivers on the market as many times the fine print will show that those power ratings only apply to just two channels driven.” True enough. Each amp channel is housed in a discrete module, the sum of which can be configured to suit any speaker setup, including those that make use of outboard amplifiers to power two or four of the AVR’s Height outputs for a 7.2.2 or 7.2.4 theater setup.

Out of the box, the MHT300 is an all-in-one solution for powering a 7.2- or 5.2.2-channel system processing either Dolby Atmos or DTS:X immersive surround sound — one that puts McIntosh’s longstanding Power Guard signal-overload and Sentry Monitor short-circuit protection technologies to use to avoid speaker damage and unsafe power conditions.

Beyond its impressive power capabilities, the MHT300 provides two discrete subwoofer outputs and is compatible with Dolby Vision, HDR10+, and HLG high dynamic range (HDR) content in addition to supporting 8K/60Hz and 4K/120Hz video on all four of its HDMI inputs and on one HDMI output. Enhanced Audio Return Channel (eARC) and ARC functionality are also supported. All ports boast 18Gbps of bandwidth and support Rec. 2020 color and 4:4:4 color spacing with 3D video pass-through.

The receiver also incorporates state-of-the-art Dirac Live processing, which optimizes system sound for the unique acoustics of any space. As McIntosh puts it, “Utilizing purpose-built audio algorithms, Dirac Live provides world-class room correction with time domain correction by means of patented mixed-phase filter technology — something that all other solutions are missing.”

Of course, to uphold the very definition of a receiver, the MHT300 includes an FM tuner but it is so focused on home theater performance that it does not offer gaming features such as variable refresh rate (VRR) and auto low-latency mode (ALLM). The receiver does include signal sensing that automatically turns the unit on when a signal is present at its input and turns it off if no input signal is detected after a set period of time.

Style-wise, the MHT300 follows traditional McIntosh design cues, including the signature black-glass front panel, illuminated McIntosh logo, silver trim, and rotary control knobs — all on a robust chassis. For more information, visit mcintoshlabs.com.